Gareth, 0.2278 percent is still a number of civilians killed. Maybe you’re ‘willing to accept’ a certain number of civilian casualties, but it pains me and a lot of other people to see it happen at all. That war had to be waged at all.

We can talk all we like about whether or not Baghdad is being razed to the ground, whether the damage is nothing at all, but the truth is, we won’t know unless we are on the streets of the city.

If the US hits its own troops…is that not incompetence? What is it? Deliberate? Competent? “We very competently mowed down our own troops.” My understanding of comptence vs. incompetence would require me to say that the accidental shelling or shooting of allied troops would fall under the category of an incompetent act. Granted, human error is always going to occur, but that doesn’t excuse such oversights, or release them from the label of incompetence.

Similarly, if our military is bombing buildings without cause, or because they contain journalists…well, what do we call it? Do we just excuse everything under the old rubric that ‘it’s war, what are we expected to do’ or do we demand that such not be countenanced? I don’t think it makes me one of the Lone Gunmen to expect that we not waste time and resources attacking the press or our allies. We have few of the latter left at this point, and our chances of attracting future ones get worse and worse if we appear (rightly or wrongly) to be willing to kill reporters to keep them from reporting.

The BBC’s defence correspondent Andrew Gilligan has cast doubt on whether the missile that killed two journalists in Baghdad today was fired by a US tank, speculating that Iraqi soldiers may have launched the lethal attack.

“I may be right in saying we’re hearing from central command that they’re starting to retract their apology for this incident,” Gilligan told Radio 5 Live’s drivetime show.

He added that after examining the scene he concluded it was virtually impossible for the US tank to have fired on the 15th floor room.

“I have to say I rather doubt it and, having been underneath it and looking up now just before it got dark at the hole again in the side of the hotel, I still doubt it.

“For a start the damage to the hotel is superficial, it’s only the masonry that’s been torn off in a very small area, a tank shell would have done more damage I feel.

“Secondly the angle that the tank would have to have reached to hit that roof, it would more or less have had to have shot just round the corner and I don’t think even the Americans have got those kinds of weapons.”

Gilligan said although American tank fire hit other parts of the hotel, it was possible an Iraqi attack was responsible for the journalists’ deaths.

“Now the Americans have admitted they fired at the hotel. There was damage to other parts of the hotel.

“This was the main one the 15th floor room, where the two people were killed and three injured, but there was also damage to rooms on the 14th and 17th floors.

“Now that might have been the responsibility of the Americans.

“This might have been the responsibility of someone else, maybe some Saddam Fedayeen with a rocket-propelled grenade, who did not like the fact the Reuters guy was shooting footage from his balcony at the time of the attack.

“That is pure speculation. I just think there must still be some doubt over this area.”

Not conclusive, but nothing else is either at this point. Worth considering.